


Time Passes

by Crowgirl



Series: The Cafe [6]
Category: Foyle's War
Genre: Awkward Flirting, Developing Friendships, Developing Relationship, Drawing, Ficlet, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, M/M, Not Beta Read, Passage of time, Past Relationship(s), Quadruple Drabble, Romantic Fluff, Semi-Unintentional Flirting, Siblings, Slow Build, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-18
Updated: 2016-04-26
Packaged: 2018-06-02 22:49:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 4,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6585718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowgirl/pseuds/Crowgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Snapshots of time at <i>the seashell</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

‘...come on, you can’t seriously be saying that!’

‘Why not?’

Foyle elbows his way through the kitchen door with a tray of scones and bumps against Andrew, standing at the sink.

‘Sorry, dad -- here, let me take that--’ Andrew takes the tray out of Foyle’s hands. ‘And you can tell Paul how wrong he is.’

‘About what? Good morning, Paul.’

Paul smiles, cupping his hands around his coffee mug. He’s leaning against the counter, elbows firmly planted. ‘Good morning.’ He nods towards the tray. ‘What did you make?’

‘I had some citron that needed using.’ Foyle plucks a scone off the tray as Andrew slides it into the case. He drops it on a plate and pushes it across the counter.

Paul breaks off a corner and pops it in his mouth. Before he can say anything, Andrew bangs the case closed and turns back around. ‘Tell Paul he can’t possibly like the last _Prime Suspect_ more than the first.’

‘The last _what?’_

Paul seems torn between laughing and swallowing for a minute. He waves a hand in a _hold on_ gesture and washes down the scone with a mouthful of coffee. ‘The TV series. Helen Mirren. Back in the ‘90s.’

‘Oh!’ Foyle shakes his head. He remembers some of the other officers talking about the program, bad jokes about Mirren and the odds of getting a female DCI for the most part. ‘I never watched it.’

‘Really?’ Paul takes another bite of the scone and hums to himself in absent enjoyment.

Foyle resists the urge to demand exactly what he’s finding so pleasant; he thinks it’s his mother coming out in him after many years but he has a hard time not requiring a breakdown of what makes any given thing he makes good or not. Paul, too, is either the most undemanding eater Foyle has ever met or the one with the broadest range of tastes; anything he makes Paul seems to enjoy. It’s just not possible.

‘When did you watch it?’ Foyle asks Andrew.

‘With mum.’ 

‘Ah.’

‘Dad never liked the police shows.’ Andrew touches his shoulder lightly, almost awkwardly, and Foyle shrugs.

‘I got enough of it in real life. Didn’t see the need to watch it at home as well.’ 

Paul pauses with the last chunk of scone in his fingers. ‘You were a policeman?’

Foyle nods. ‘Twenty years.’

‘Where?’

‘London.’


	2. Chapter 2

‘Mr. Foyle, look at this.’ Sam pauses, the dish tub propped on her hip, and drops a napkin on the counter.

He raises an eyebrow at her, not bothering to take his hand off the open cash drawer he’s counting out, and she laughs. ‘No, look at it.’

He pulls it forward into the light, then picks it up so he can see better. It _is_ a napkin, but it’s mostly a sketch of the beach outside. ‘Yes?’

‘It’s a lovely sketch, don’t you think?’

He studies it for a minute. The picture had been drawn in the full light of afternoon and it's dark outside now, but he knows the view by heart. The artist had used the front windows as a frame around the view of the beach, but the edges are all fuzzy pencil strokes that fade into nothing, making the sand and water stand out like something seen through a clearing in fog. There’s a feeling of open-ness, space in the lines that he likes. There aren’t any figures, just the sweep of the beach and the water. ‘Yes, it is. Did you do it?’

Sam snorts and continues on her way to the kitchen. ‘Not likely. I found it on a table.’

Foyle studies it a moment longer, then turns and fastens it to the wall behind the sink with a bit of tape. 

* * *

A few nights later, Andrew finds another drawing. This one, done on the blank back of half a flyer, is a close-up study of one of the small ivy plants Sam has on the back corner of the counter.

Andrew leaves it on the counter as he sweeps his way by and Foyle tacks it up next to the other drawing. He stands for a minute and looks at them side by side. 

They look to him to be done by the same hand; the drawing of the beach is hazier, the plant sharper, but he puts that down to the difference between drawing on a napkin and drawing on real paper. 

* * *

After that, one of them finds a sketch fairly regularly, at least once a week. A few of them are decidedly unfinished and, once or twice, crumpled, as if the artist had given up; Sam smoothes those out and flattens them with one of Foyle’s cookbooks. There’s one Foyle particularly likes of the view from the chair where Paul usually sits, the open window showing the beach and the long arc of the breakwater. 

There are never any full figures -- once, there’s a hand, palm up, fingers loosely curled, resting on the table beside a half-empty coffee cup and there are sometimes suggestions of sketchy human figures for the sake of perspective but that’s all.

* * *

It’s long after the start of warm weather and Paul has regularly been staying until close and past, seeming to have nothing better to do with his time at ten o’clock at night than help gather up stray cups and saucers, water plants, dust down fairy lights, and chat to Foyle.

Foyle is tidying the furniture in the front, pushing tables and chairs back together, and Paul is carefully pinching dead leaves off a straggling spider plant. Foyle opens the window by Paul’s chair more widely; the day had been hot and the muggy heat still hasn’t cleared out well after sunset. The breeze lifts a sheet of paper off the low table and wafts it under the next table over; Foyle pulls it out with the toe of his shoe and picks it up. He squints up at the counter and moves to stand directly in front of Paul’s chair -- the angle is a perfect match. ‘These are yours, aren’t they?’ 

‘What’s mine?’ Paul looks back at him. ‘Oh. Er.’ He bites his lip and glances back at the small array of drawings on the wall. ‘Yes. Well. Most of them.’ He points. ‘Those two -- those aren’t mine.’ 

Foyle comes up to stand beside him. ‘I thought they looked a bit different.’ One was an unshaded line drawing of a table and chair; the other, the open hand next to the coffee cup.

‘I didn’t -- expect you to keep them.’ Paul is focusing on the plant again and Foyle thinks he looks slightly flushed, as if Foyle had touched on something embarrassing.

‘Sam found the first one. I thought it was too good to throw away. I didn’t realise it was the start of a collection.’ Foyle studies the drawing in front of him and tries to think of something to say that will relieve Paul’s evident unease. He thinks of telling Paul how the quiet of the drawings had become a touchstone for him during busy days, a reminder that the entire world is not one hive of loud customers.

‘That’s…’ Paul looks at the wall again and laughs, shaking his head. ‘That’s really too kind of you.’ He gestures at the collection. ‘They’re not...’ He shakes his head again and falls silent, running his thumb along the rim of the plant pot.

‘Really? I think they’re quite good.’ Foyle traces an edge of the drawing in front of him with a fingertip. ‘I’ve -- become rather fond of them.’ 

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Paul glance at him and, for a moment, he can feel his pulse in his fingertips. But Paul doesn’t move and Foyle clears his throat, pushes the new drawing over the counter, and goes back to the chairs.


	3. Chapter 3

Paul has a proper sketchbook, of course. It’s more of a combined sketchbook-diary-planner thing really: anything from grocery lists to quick cartoons to stray phrases meant to remind him of something go into it. The drawings on stray bits of paper are nothing more than a rest from the laptop screen. He doesn’t think anything of them and certainly doesn’t expect to come into the cafe one day and see two of them posted up behind the counter. 

He almost asks Andrew what they are, who found them, why on earth they’re up on the wall -- but he doesn’t. Instead, he takes his coffee, chats about the football for a minute, and makes sure to sketch something on the back of an index card he’d been using as a bookmark. He feels like he’s in a bad spy movie when he leaves the card under his coffee cup.

* * *

When he comes in the next morning, the card is on the wall. 

* * *

‘I’ve become quite fond of them,’ Foyle says, not looking at him, and Paul feels a flush of heat over his throat and face and fixes his eyes on the spider plant. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Foyle stroke a thumb over the edge of the drawing in front of him and pause, his fingertips resting lightly on the paper. Then, as if having come to some internal decision, Foyle slides the sheet across the counter, clearly leaving it to be added to the collection, and turns back to his rearranging of furniture. 

Paul pulls another two or three dead leaves loose and drops them into the wastebasket by his feet. He glances at the drawing beside him and then at Foyle who is leaning out to pull the front windows shut. The pale edges of the window frame make a stark contrast against the dark sand and water, framing Foyle’s white shirt, the line of his back, the press of his hip against the sill and Paul wishes---

Before he can think about it too much, he tears off the blank half of the sheet on the counter and scrawls a few lines with the worn-down pencil by the espresso machine. As Foyle pulls the last window shut, Paul folds the sheet and stuffs it in his pocket.

* * *

Paul digs in one of his unopened boxes from London, kicked under his bed and more or less forgotten for the past few months, and finds a couple of his good drawing pencils and a half-empty box of charcoal sticks. The first one crumbles in his fingers, but he presses a fingertip into the dust and uses it as shadow.

He finishes the sketch sitting cross-legged on Alice’s couch with his sketchbook acting as a lap desk. He spends more time on it than he has on any drawing for a long time and the last thing he does is sign his name neatly in the lower right-hand corner.

‘It’s good.’ Alice leans over the back of the couch. ‘What are you going to do with it?’

He cranes his head back and smiles at her. ‘Give it away, what else?’

She whaps him gently on the back of the head. ‘You know you could pay your rent with those if you’d just try to sell them.’

He shrugs and rolls his shoulders, stretching out the sore spots he hadn’t noticed until he stopped working on the sketch. ‘Maybe.’

‘You’re giving it to the cafe?’ Alice reaches over his shoulder and shifts the paper slightly so she can see the drawing more clearly. ‘They giving you lots of free coffee or something?’ 

‘Does it have to be for something?’ Paul covers the sketch carefully with a thin sheet of blank paper and tucks the whole thing into his sketchbook. 

* * *

This one he puts right on the counter, taking advantage of Foyle’s momentary distraction in the kitchen just after closing to place it by the till and leave. His heartbeat almost hurts, heavy in his chest, as he lets the door close quietly behind him.


	4. Chapter 4

‘So what happened with the drawing?’ Alice leans back in her chair and takes a sip of wine.

Paul shrugs. ‘Nothing. I left it on the counter.’

‘You _left_ it on the _counter?_ You couldn’t even put it in the man’s _hand?’_

Paul shifts, glancing away from her and trying to make it look as though the cushion under his left hip is in a bad position. It isn’t and he knows Alice knows this. ‘It wasn’t -- I didn’t make it _for_ anyone.’

Alice arches an eyebrow at him and says nothing and he sighs. ‘I don’t think he’s... interested, all right? And I had enough of that with Jane. I’m not doing it again.’

‘You don’t think---’ Alice echoes him back to himself for a minute, then falls silent, looking out over the balcony railing. The parking lot is directly below them and, beyond that, the tall wooden fence meant to hold back the sand and scrub grass. But, beyond that, there’s nothing but a rocky stretch of beach and then water. The sun has already set but light is still glowing in the sky and off the water, the first stars sparking out above.

‘It’s not important anyway,’ Paul says, feeling the nudge of the silence. ‘I did the sketching because I wanted to not -- not because I wanted a date.’ He sighs involuntarily as he hears himself, then buries his face in his wineglass so he won’t have to look Alice in the face.

‘Paul...you know I’m not a matchmaker, I’ve never gotten in your face about who you date or when or where or how--’ She’s speaking very carefully and has put her glass back on the small table between them, her hands palm down on either side of it. ‘Not even when Jane was clearly the worst thing for you that you could have possibly found and you just didn’t realise it yet.’

She pauses, not looking up at him.

‘Al?’ He leans forward.

‘But I’ve been in that cafe with the two of you and I’m not blind so let me tell you this.’ She clears her throat and looks up at him seriously. ‘The way Foyle looks at you? Does not indicate to me that he is thinking heterosexual thoughts.’

‘Ally!’ 

She’s grinning at him, then laughing, falling back in her chair. 


	5. Chapter 5

Foyle pauses to wash his hands after setting the small dishwasher running and wipes them dry with slightly unnecessary care. He glances up at his reflection in the dark glass of the window and scowls at himself. 

_If you’re going to do it, do it and get it over with. Then if you’ve made a fool of yourself, it’s done._

‘Paul, I was wondering if--’ He pushes the kitchen door open as he speaks and finds himself talking to an empty room. ‘Ah. Well.’ He clears his throat and drops the towel still in his hands into the laundry basket. ‘So much for that.’

He clears his throat again, fighting the desire to start swearing out of sheer disappointment, and walks forward to pull open the empty drawer of the till; anyone looking in the windows can at least see there’s no cash about. 

He doesn’t see the drawing until he’s walked around the counter to turn out the main lights from the panel of switches by the front door. The only light left is the lamp behind the counter and the lights in the kitchen. The white paper catches his eye immediately.

He frowns at it for a minute; honestly, he’d rather have had Paul still be there than another drawing. They’re starting to feel a bit like a code he can’t work out.

It takes him a minute to understand the scene he’s looking at and then he can’t decide if he wants to sit down until his breath comes back or try to track Paul down to his sister’s flat right this minute. 

Instead of doing either, he makes himself stand still and take a long breath. He recognizes everything on the page; he feels now that he knows Paul’s hand so well that he would recognize his version of the cafe if he were to see it anywhere. Paul tends to leave edges unfinished which gives almost every piece of his that Foyle has seen the same feeling of lightness that he had liked in the first little sketch.

He also knows he’s looking at himself near the front windows; God only knows he’s made that same gesture hundreds of times, that awkward one-armed lean to grab the catch of the window when it swings out slightly too far.

But the figure in the sketch in front of him doesn’t look awkward. He doesn’t know which night this was and he’s sure he hadn’t been paying attention to whether or not Paul was looking at him so he can't honestly suspect himself of _posing_ in some way. 

He brushes a fingertip lightly over the figure -- himself -- and tries to decide how much of what he is seeing is wishful thinking and how much actually on the page. The obvious course would be to ask someone else’s opinion -- but he can’t quite see himself doing that. He can’t imagine how he would ask the question in any case: _Is it my imagination or does this seem...?_ And what word would he choose? Affectionate? Almost but there’s something more there -- or is he just seeing what he wants to see? 

The clock chimes in the kitchen and he shakes his head sharply. Midnight is far too late to be standing in an empty room staring at a sketch and trying to divine the mind of the sketcher.


	6. Chapter 6

When Paul goes into the cafe a day later and doesn’t see the finished sketch on the wall with the others, he decides he’s been given about as clear a response as he could have hoped to get from such a veiled question. It’s certainly not the response he _wanted_ \-- but perhaps it's what he deserves for trying to make a silly little drawing do the work of words. 

Nevertheless, he’s an adult and, if he spends the next two days with an unpleasant mental soundtrack and a slightly sour feeling, that’s no-one’s business but his.

* * *

What confuses him as the rest of the week goes by is that Foyle’s behavior doesn’t alter; if anything, he’s slightly more relaxed, easier than he was before. Paul even notices himself being watched more than once; the second time, he waits until Foyle realises he’s been caught and smiles; Foyle flushes but smiles back before ducking away.

* * *

‘I brought you that recipe--’ Paul pulls the folded piece of paper out of his wallet and slides it across the counter, accepting his mug in return. ‘For those lacy wafers.’

He doesn’t know how they had ended up talking about his mother’s recipe collection the previous evening or how he had ended up telling Foyle about the binders of recipes he and Alice had tucked away in her kitchen or the time he had tried to recreate his mum’s ginger biscuit recipe for Alice’s birthday and ended up with crumbs instead of dough. He had found the scribbled reminder to himself in his notebook this morning: _the ones over the spoon handles - lace_ and it had only taken him a few puzzled minutes to figure out what he had been talking about. 

But -- he isn’t really sure how their conversations ever start: perhaps Foyle had asked about the flavor of a scone? Or had Paul made a comment about the dinner he made the night before? He knows he and Foyle had ended up standing side by side, leaning on the counter, and he had been acutely aware of the warmth of Foyle’s arm next to his.

‘Oh, yes, thank you.’ Foyle flattens the sheet and studies it for a minute as Paul takes his first sip of coffee. ‘Mm, yes. Well, since this is really your family recipe--’ He glances up at Paul. ‘--would you help me make the first batch?’

Before Paul can say anything, Sam comes in from the kitchen, shaking raindrops off her bright hair. ‘Here you are, Mr. Foyle, I finally got it done -- I’m sorry it took me so long. I couldn’t get into the workshop as quickly as I wanted.’ She hands Foyle a package carefully wrapped in a water-speckled Waitrose bag. 

Foyle pushes the recipe to one side and pulls a brown-paper wrapped rectangle from the plastic. He hands the bag back to Sam who stuffs it in her jacket pocket. She’s clearly waiting to see Foyle’s reaction to whatever the wrapped thing is and Paul picks his mug off the counter so there’s a clear space. Foyle undoes the brown paper quickly and it’s clearly something in a picture frame -- and it’s Paul’s sketch. 

For a minute, Paul has absolutely no idea what his face looks like. He guesses he must either be staring or blushing to his hairline because Foyle looks up at him and the corners of his mouth twitch as if he wants to smile. And, like noticing that he’s thirsty after a long walk, Paul realises he _wants_ to see that smile. 

Foyle tilts the framed picture towards him. ‘I thought it deserved a little better treatment than tape. And, thank you, Sam. This is perfect.’

Paul’s ears are humming as he nods, unable to come up with anything to say. He is as close as he has been in his life to giving in to the impulse of a moment, leaning over the counter and kissing Foyle as hard as he can. 

Foyle looks at him for a long minute and Paul wonders if his thought shows on his face as he sees a slow flush of color over Foyle's cheekbones. ‘You’ll have to help me choose a place to hang it.’ Foyle picks up the framed piece carefully and tilts his head towards the kitchen. ‘Come on.’


	7. Chapter 7

‘Hey, Sam.’ Andrew lets the front door bang behind him and shakes his head hard, sending drops of water flying off the ends of his dark hair. He runs his fingers through it in a vain attempt to flatten it back down and blinks at her, then grins. ‘Nice day, huh?’

Sam looks out the window at the steady grey drizzle and the soft drift of fog coming in off the water, then smiles at him. ‘Not too bad.’

Andrew chuckles as he comes towards the counter, unslinging his bag. ‘You like all kinds of weather.’

‘Isn’t it better than only liking a few? Ah--’ She steps between him and the kitchen door when he turns in that direction. ‘I might -- not. Just now.’

‘Why?’ He swipes a raindrop off his forehead. ‘Dad’s bread burn again?’

‘Er -- no, but -- I finally got that drawing framed for him and Paul was here when I brought it in and--’ She tilts her head towards the kitchen.

‘Ah. Oh.’ Andrew looks thoughtfully at the door and, for a minute, she can’t read his expression. He weighs his bag in his hand absently and chews on the corner of his bottom lip, a faint line showing between his eyebrows.

‘Andrew --’ She doesn’t know how to continue the sentence. _Your father seems really happy? Please don’t be an ass about this?_

Andrew shakes himself out of his reverie and smiles at her. ‘Well. Good. I thought it would take him longer than this, honestly.’ He slings his bag under the counter and shrugs out of his wet jacket, draping it over the back of the nearest chair. ‘Think you and I can keep back the ravening hordes single-handed?’


	8. Chapter 8

Foyle puts the framed drawing down on the table and switches on the oven before turning to Paul. ‘What do you think?’

For a minute, Paul isn’t sure what he’s being asked, then Foyle waves a hand at the rest of the room. ‘Oh! I--hm.’ He turns his back to the door and examines the room. 

At first glance, it strikes him as being mostly windows, like the front part of the seating area. The wall above the sink, counter, and oven is all windows -- three broad panes that look out on a tumble of sand, ragged grass, and rocks leading up towards the road. Despite the grey drizzle outside, two of the windows are pushed open.

There are built-in cupboards below the counter, but someone has put up broad shelving along the inner wall; about half of the shelves are stuffed with ingredients of one kind or another, the other half is pots and pans. The wooden table and chairs in the middle of the room are well-scrubbed and worn. They look comfortable and he has a sudden flash of what it might be like to sit here as Foyle tested out the wafer recipe and Paul would get to watch Foyle move around this space where he so obviously felt comfortable, that was _his,_ and that he let Paul share -- perhaps even wanted him to share. The thought makes something in his chest ache with wanting and he has to blink hard to bring himself back to the actual present moment.

Foyle is still looking at him, eyebrows slightly raised, and Paul wonders if his thoughts show that baldly on his face -- but, if they do, Foyle doesn’t look the least bit worried by what he sees.

Glancing around, it looks to Paul as though the only places available to hang anything at all are either the spot directly behind the door -- a very bad idea for the glass -- or next to the shelves and he takes a breath to say so, but Foyle speaks before he can say anything.

He’s looking down at the drawing again, touching the frame gently. ‘This is--’ He pauses, biting thoughtfully at the corner of his lower lip, and looks up at Paul. ‘Actually, I’m not entirely sure what this is.’ 

Paul swallows hard, his throat gone abruptly scratchy and sore. ‘I just wanted to -- you’ve been so kind and--’

‘Kind?’ Foyle’s eyebrows go up and he glances down at the drawing and then back at Paul. ‘Forgive me but -- kindness was not the idea I gathered from this.’

Paul can feel himself blushing and he swallows again. ‘No, well, I.’ He stops and clears his throat. ‘It -- may not have been the only thing I was thinking of.’

‘No.’ Foyle turns the drawing so Paul can see it and then walks around the end of the table to stand beside him, close enough that Paul can feel the brush of his cuffed sleeve where Foyle has it turned up above his elbow. He stands quietly for a minute, apparently studying the walls, then adds, ‘I always thought I looked a bit of an idiot trying to close the windows that way. I really should just walk around outside but--’ He shrugs. ‘It’s faster.’ 

‘You don’t.’ Paul sees Foyle glance sideways at him. ‘Look an idiot, I mean.’ He can feel his pulse in his fingertips and he’s almost certain that he’s being given tacit permission to touch but he can’t seem to move. He clears his throat and points to a random spot on the empty half of the wall. ‘I think it might look good there.’

‘Mm.’ Foyle studies the spot thoughtfully for a minute, then reaches out and covers Paul’s hand with his own, gently redirecting the gesture to an empty space above the sink, quite high on the wall. ‘I think there.’ He lets their hands drop back but doesn’t let go. Paul can feel the cautious press of Foyle’s warm palm against his own. ‘I’d prefer to have it in front of me rather than behind.’

‘Yes.’ Paul lets out his breath slowly, letting his fingers slip between Foyle’s and their arms press together from wrist to shoulder. ‘Yes, I think that’s an excellent idea.’

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [Kivrin](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Kivrin) for the title suggestion. ;)


End file.
